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Comment Electric Cars will make it worse (Score 3, Funny) 450

by mark99 (#33494636) Attached to: Australia To Fight iPod Use By Pedestrians

Electric cars emit much less noise. I think we will need to have a protocol whereby iPods can sense potential collisions and warn the listeners. Cars are getting anti-collision devices and software anyway in the coming years, they shoud expand the protocolls to iPods too.
Hmm - maybe I should patent that idea :).

Comment Breathless Panic about nothing (Score 1) 1268

by mark99 (#33240320) Attached to: US Students Struggle With Understanding of the 'Equal' Sign

Jeez. There have always been lots of people who are crappy at math. And there still are. This is like reporting about rain. Yes - there is a general decline in math skills, but there has been a compensating advance in IQ and abstract reasoning. Society requires different skills than it used to - and frankly Math has always been of limited use to all but a chosen few.
There are admittedly problems with our society, but your average Joe messing up symbolic manipulation is not really one of the biggies, and should not be high on the list of things we are worried about. IMHO.
Math

Man Uses Drake Equation To Explain Girlfriend Woes 538

Posted by samzenpus from the less-math-more-social-science dept.
artemis67 writes "A man studying in London has taken a mathematical equation that predicts the possibility of alien life in the universe to explain why he can't find a girlfriend. Peter Backus, a native of Seattle and PhD candidate and Teaching Fellow in the Department of Economics at the University of Warwick, near London, in his paper, 'Why I don't have a girlfriend: An application of the Drake Equation to love in the UK,' used math to estimate the number of potential girlfriends in the UK. In describing the paper on the university Web site he wrote 'the results are not encouraging. The probability of finding love in the UK is only about 100 times better than the probability of finding intelligent life in our galaxy.'"
Games

Game Endings Going Out of Style? 190

Posted by Soulskill from the to-be-continued dept.
An article in the Guardian asks whether the focus of modern games has shifted away from having a clear-cut ending and toward indefinite entertainment instead. With the rise of achievements, frequent content updates and open-ended worlds, it seems like publishers and developers are doing everything they can to help this trend. Quoting: "Particularly before the advent of 'saving,' the completion of even a simple game could take huge amounts of patience, effort and time. The ending, like those last pages of a book, was a key reason why we started playing in the first place. Sure, multiplayer and arcade style games still had their place, but fond 8, 16 and 32-bit memories consist more of completion and satisfaction than particular levels or tricky moments. Over the past few years, however, the idea of a game as simply something to 'finish' has shifted somewhat. For starters, the availability of downloadable content means no story need ever end, as long as the makers think there's a paying audience. Also, the ubiquity of broadband means multiplayer gaming is now the standard, not the exception it once was. There is no real 'finish' to most MMORPGs."
Image

Living In Tokyo's Capsule Hotels 269

Posted by samzenpus from the living-in-the-hive dept.
afabbro writes "Capsule Hotel Shinjuku 510 once offered a night’s refuge to salarymen who had missed the last train home. Now with Japan enduring its worst recession since World War II, it is becoming an affordable option for people with nowhere else to go. The Hotel 510’s capsules are only 6 1/2 feet long by 5 feet wide. Guests must keep possessions, like shirts and shaving cream, in lockers outside of the capsules. Atsushi Nakanishi, jobless since Christmas says, 'It’s just a place to crawl into and sleep. You get used to it.'”
Games

The Struggle For Private Game Servers 125

Posted by Soulskill from the let's-make-onyxia-fight-ragnaros dept.
A story at the BBC takes a look at the use of private game servers for games that tend not to allow them. While most gamers are happy to let companies like Blizzard and NCSoft administer the servers that host their MMORPGs, others want different rules, a cheaper way to play, or the technical challenge of setting up their own. A South African player called Hendrick put up his own WoW server because the game "wasn't available in the country at the time." A 21-year-old Swede created a server called Epilogue, which "had strict codes of conduct and rules, as well as a high degree of customized content (such as new currency, methods of earning experience, the ability to construct buildings and hire non-player characters, plus 'permanent' player death) unavailable in the retail version of the game." The game companies make an effort to quash these servers when they can, though it's frequently more trouble that it's worth. An NCSoft representative referenced the "growing menace" of IP theft, and a Blizzard spokesperson said,"We also have a responsibility to our players to ensure the integrity and reliability of their World of Warcraft gaming experience and that responsibility compels us to protect our rights."
Games

Copyright and the Games Industry 94

Posted by Soulskill from the your-super-mario-toilet-paper-is-probably-illegal dept.
A recent post at the Press Start To Drink blog examined the relationship the games industry has with copyright laws. More so than in some other creative industries, the reactions of game companies to derivative works are widely varied and often unpredictable, ranging anywhere from active support to situations like the Chrono Trigger: Crimson Echoes debacle. Quoting: "... even within the gaming industry, there is a tension between IP holders and fan producers/poachers. Some companies, such as Epic and Square Enix, remain incredibly protective of their Intellectual Property, threatening those that use their creations, even for non-profit, cultural reasons, with legal suits. Other companies, like Valve, seem to, if not embrace, at least tolerate, and perhaps even tacitly encourage this kind of fan engagement with their work. Lessig suggests, 'The opportunity to create and transform becomes weakened in a world in which creation requires permission and creativity must check with a lawyer.' Indeed, the more developers and publishers that take up Valve's position, the more creativity and innovation will emerge out of video game fan communities, already known for their intense fandom and desire to add to, alter, and re-imagine their favorite gaming universes."

Comment Duh (Score 1) 318

by mark99 (#29481941) Attached to: Who Wants To Be a Billionaire Coder?

Yes. Coding, and partying. With occastional vacations to nice spots like Thailand or Greece. Kind of like how I spent my 20's ;).

I would do visualization projects of various kinds - all with some heavy math component.

Comment Win7 (Score 1) 864

by mark99 (#26508559) Attached to: Windows 7's Media Hype Having the Opposite Effect As Vista's

The opinions here are what one would expect unfortunately.

I have been using Win7 - it is pleasently fast and I know someone who put it on a netbook, worked as well as XP.

It still looks kind of unpolished.

One of Vista's weak points was the AppCompat - the new security model broke too many apps and caused big companies a lot of pain, some to the point where they gave up. But for them Linux or Mac is simply not an option.

It remains to be seen if Win7 offers relief there. I suspect it does not offer much on that front, but even if it were just a little better it would be enough for many big companies to skip Vista.

Comment Re:Not Reusable (Score 1) 82

by mark99 (#26298089) Attached to: Falcon 9 Is Now Fully Integrated At Cape Canaveral

I love SpaceX, and think they are doing a great job, but I don't know where you got this idea that they continually deliver on their claims on time. If NASA of the 60's had a SpaceX kind of record we would have landed on the moon in something like 1979, not 1969.

Some examples are the 3 Falcon 1 failures and this annoncment from 2005; http://www.spacequest.com/Articles/The%20SpaceX%20Falcon%20Will%20Challenge%20Orbital%20Sciences%20.doc/

However I can only agree that SpaceX seems far superior to the rest of the NASA/Aerospace complex who aren't even willing to look at an idea without spending 100s of million's first.

Comment Re:Fat Chance (Score 1) 151

by mark99 (#26222607) Attached to: NASA Outsources ISS Resupply To SpaceX, Orbital

I imagine that when NASA launches a Falcon 9, they will manage to spend hundreds of millions on themselves somehow as well (you know, planning it, managing it, quality control, etc). Fixed and sunk costs that are now considered to be in the Space Shuttle launch, but will now be transfered to SpaceX and Oribital Sciences.

In fact if I know my NASA, I bet in the end they will somehow make these launches even more expensive than the Shuttle is/was, especially with the economic downturn conveniently justifying practically any expenditure.

And no, sadly I am not making a joke.

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